Jason Segel on making ‘Sex Tape’ with Cameron Diaz
SEGEL. “I’m incredibly flexible for a giant human being.” RUBEN V. NEPALES
LOS ANGELES—A naked Jason Segel does a headstand in a scene in “Sex Tape,” and what does Cameron Diaz instinctively do? “As soon as I did it, Cameron, without missing a beat, hopped behind me, which is not what I expected,” Jason said. “But, it speaks to how relentlessly funny she is.”
The headstand is one of the sexual positions that Jason and Cameron try in “Sex Tape,” writer-director Jake Kasdan’s comedy about a couple who decide to make a sex tape to spice up their marriage. But, the video gets accidentally leaked to their family, friends, coworkers and…their mailman.
Apparently, being able to do a headstand, with or without clothes, is one of Jason’s talents. “I have always been able to do a headstand,” said the actor, whose 6’4” frame doesn’t inhibit him from inverting his posture. “Since I was a kid, I have always tried to work it into everything I do!”
He credited Cameron for being “totally game” as they shot various sexual positions. “Cameron is so beautiful yet so lacking in vanity, pride or shame,” Jason said with a smile. “She was willing to go real hard at the comedy, which was necessary, because some scenes are truly humiliating.”
“I don’t want to spoil any illusion, but we are wearing modesty patches,” Jason said of the patch or sock that actors wear to cover their private parts.
Gravity
But, when Jason did the headstand, he was completely unencumbered, so to speak. “I wasn’t wearing a modesty patch, because gravity wasn’t working,” Jason said, smiling. “We didn’t know what direction we’re going to go in.”
Does he look at his partner’s body in an intimate scene? He was frank: “You totally look and say that you’re acting.”
“It was a lot of fun,” stressed the actor about the shoot. “We get this question a lot—was it awkward or sexy? It didn’t feel like either of those, to be honest. Cameron and I know each other very well. Jake is a good friend of ours, so it was three days in a room with us in costumes and strange positions.”
Laughing, Jason shared, “And Jake standing on top of us with a little GoPro camera, going, “Faster! Faster!’ If anything, it felt like we were having a threesome with a total pervert!”
The couple are shown going through “The Joy of Sex,” the classic 1970s self-help book that comes with illustrations of a myriad of sexual positions.
Some of the illustrated positions demand the skills of a gymnast or contortionist. “Surprisingly, I’m incredibly flexible for a giant human being,” Jason pointed out. “There are few limitations in that regard. What’s interesting about the movie is that it feels incredibly risqué. But, if you break it down, frame by frame, it’s not particularly graphic. It alludes more to things. So, the challenge in the positions was to have them elicit the response of ‘Oh my God!’ without showing too much.”
On the chubby side
The actor, who used to be on the chubby side, is fit these days. “I hit 30 and realized that I was going to have to be friends with my body—if I wanted it to be a long time, I had to start taking care of myself,” he enthused.
He also thought Jay, his character, should be trim, so it’s credible that overwhelming parenting and career demands are the reasons why Jay and Annie no longer have that spice in their lives. “I didn’t want the audience to look at Cameron and me next to each other and think that there might be another reason they are not having sex. So, that was part of the goal—it was story-related.”
Jason hopes that “Sex Tape” will help couples. “What I hope the movie will do, in all honesty, is that you will get in the car with your date after the movie, and you will laugh about some of the things. Then, there will be a quiet moment when you are driving. You will look at each other and hopefully a conversation will be spurred about something like, ‘We haven’t been together in a while. It’s been a long time.’ My hope is that the film does start a conversation and bring that back into people’s lives.”
Looking into the future, Jason was asked about his plans, especially since his comedy TV series, “How I Met Your Mother,” has ended its successful run.
“I’m going to take a nice break from television,” he declared. “‘How I Met Your Mother’ lasted about a decade, which is a long time. I was blessed to be a part of it.
“I am writing a lot. I tend to write comedies—that’s where my mind goes. But, I just did a movie called ‘The End of the Tour,’ where I play David Foster Wallace. My goal is to move between things that move me.”
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